New Delhi: Leaders of the BRICS countries on Wednesday (October 23) expressed “grave concern” at the escalating violence in Palestine – which they attributed to the Israeli military’s operations – and called for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.
Saying that the “Israeli military’s offensive” has led to the “mass killing and injury of civilians, forced displacement and widespread destruction of civilian infrastructure”, the world leaders “stress[ed] the urgent need” for an “immediate, comprehensive and permanent ceasefire in the Gaza Strip”.
Apart from underscoring the need for either side in the Israel-Hamas war to release those illegally detained and for aid to reach Gaza unhindered, the BRICS leaders in their ‘Kazan Declaration’ also condemned Israel’s attacks on UN personnel, calling on Tel Aviv to “immediately cease such activity”.
Held in Kazan, Russia, the 16th BRICS summit ended on Wednesday and featured for the first time in 14 years participation by new member states, who were invited to join the grouping last year.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi attended the summit, where among his other counterparts he met Chinese President Xi Jinping in their first bilateral meeting in five years, marking a thaw in ties that were frozen since the border clashes in 2020.
Speaking as the Israel-Hamas war as well as the Russia-Ukraine war still raged on, Modi said during his remarks at the summit on Wednesday that the BRICS countries “support dialogue and diplomacy, not war”.
Modi endorses ‘respect’ for views of founding members, reform of institutions
India stood ready to welcome the new countries in BRICS as partner countries, Modi said, adding that “in this regard all decisions should be taken by consensus, and the views of BRICS founding members should be respected”.
Initially comprising Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, the grouping invited Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to join it last year.
While Argentina declined and Saudi Arabia is yet to join, the other countries have become BRICS members.
Modi said at the summit’s ‘closed plenary’ that the BRICS countries needed to “give the world the message that BRICS is not a divisive organisation but one that works in the interest of humanity”.
He also endorsed a reform of global institutions such as the UN Security Council and the World Trade Organisation, saying that BRICS ought to “move forward in a time bound manner” in this regard.
However, BRICS must be careful not to “acquire the image of [an organisation] that is trying to replace global institutions” as opposed to one that “wishes to reform them”, he added.
During his address to the closed plenary session Modi spoke of the need to counter terrorism, saying there is “no place for double standards” on the issue. He advocated for the adoption of a Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism in the UN.
India first suggested a draft anti-terrorism convention in 1996, but its proposal has remained frozen due to the inability of the international community to reach a definition for ‘terrorism’.
Modi also touted the New Development Bank, which is also known as the BRICS Bank and was established in 2015 as an alternative to the World Bank and the IMF, as an “an important option for the development needs”.
The bank’s India regional office operates from the GIFT City in Gandhinagar, Gujarat.
The Indian prime minister also said at the BRICS’s open plenary that “multipolarity” was a strength of the nine-member grouping.
